The aim of this study was to examine the effects of using inquiry-based learning on students’ critical thinking skills. A quasi-experimental design which employed time series design with single group participants was used. A total of 20 EFL undergraduate students who took advanced writing skills course were selected using comprehensive sampling method. Tests, focus group discussion, and student-reflective journal were used to gather data on the students’ critical thinking skills. The participants were given a series of three argumentative essay writing pretests both before and after the intervention, inquiry-based argumentative essay writing instruction. While the quantitative data were analyzed using One-Way Repeated Measures ANOVA, the qualitative data were analyzed through narration. The findings of the study revealed that using inquiry-based argumentative writing instruction enhances students’ critical thinking skills. Therefore, inquiry-based instruction is suggested as a means to improve students’ critical thinking skills because the method enhances students' interpretation, analysis, evaluation, inference, explanation, and self-regulation skills which are the core critical thinking skills.
An increasing number of studies have confirmed that written corrective feedback (hereafter WCF) is vital for improving learners’ L2 writing. However, many scholars could not agree whether this improvement was due to direct, indirect, or both forms of WCF. Thus, this study first investigated the role of WCF students’ writing achievement; it then investigated if there was a statistically significant difference in writing achievement between groups that received direct and indirect WCF forms. To this end, a quasi-experimental research design involving three intact first-year classes from a university found in northwest Ethiopia was used. Two experimental groups and one comparison group of learners were participants in this study. Test scores analyzed by analysis of covariance (ANCOVA) revealed that WCF has an influential role in enhancing learners’ writing performance. Moreover, this study showed that learners in the direct WCF accompanied by a metalinguistic explanation group outperformed their counterparts in the indirect WCF group in writing paragraphs. Based on the study’s findings, it is possible to conclude that the provision of WCF is vital in the Ethiopian context; moreover, learners could benefit more from using linguistic structures correctly if metalinguistic explanations accompany the provision of direct WCF.
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